Education in Atjeh — the network of village-, girls’-, government-native-, Dutch-native-, agricultural-, trade- and Europeans’ schools built up by the Government of Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden between 1905 and 1923 — was the proudest welfare record of the later pacification: from 5 village-schools with some 300 pupils when Governor Swart took office (1908) to 242 schools with nearly 13,000 pupils in 1918, 25,000 children under instruction in 1921, and an inspection transferred to the ordinary Indies school service.
Van Daalen’s beginning
Under G. C. E. van Daalen (1905–1908) five village-schools (volksscholen) were opened in Groot-Atjeh and five new schools taken in building; in the Dependencies there were as yet no native first-class schools, though some lower government and private establishments of education existed. Van Daalen proposed the foundation in Groot-Atjeh of so-called kampongscholen in the sense that in every moekim such a school would arise, and equally the foundation of a school with boarding (internaat) at Koeta Radja for sons of native chiefs, where instruction would be given in the Dutch language.
Swart’s programme, 1908–1918
“But the instruction had to be directed to the practice of life, for the boy as for the girl”: for the girl an important place for hand- and household-work; for the boy, beside school-instruction, agriculture teaching, so that he might be kept for the farm. Governor Swart’s numbers climbed: 5 village-schools with about 300 pupils at his accession; 125 with 6,000 pupils in 1911; 242 with nearly 13,000 pupils in 1918. The government native schools, 4 in 1908 (all in Groot-Atjeh), had climbed to 28 province-wide in 1918. The first girls’ school opened in 1910 at Oelèë Lheue; after she had sufficiently proven her viability, two more girls’ schools followed in 1913 in Groot-Atjeh, and gradually more such establishments in the Dependencies; in 1918 there were 15 girls’ schools in the whole province with more than 1,000 pupils — the curriculum (fine and useful handiwork, bobbin-lace, weaving etc.) being spread over six instead of three school-years, in the hope of fighting the kinderhuwelijken (child-marriages). A Hollandsch-Indlandsche school opened at Koeta Radja in 1915, and in 1916 at Lho Seumawè and Langsar; at his urgency a Hollandsch-Chineesche school at Koeta Radja was opened in 1918. For children of Ambonese soldiers a special Ambonese school was founded at Koeta Radja on his proposal in 1911, counting nearly 400 pupils in 1918. Public European lower schools opened at Sigli and Langsar, and in 1915 a neutral fröbel-school at Koeta Radja. A native trade school (ambachtschool) opened in 1916 at Koeta Radja for the carpenters needed in the kampongs.
Higher and agricultural education
The agricultural schools at Beureunoen and Oeléë Karang, founded under Swart, kept farming as the first means of existence. For chiefs’ sons the education had first taken place at the native normal school (Inl. Kweekschool) at Fort de Kock, several moreover being sent to the training school at Bandoeng, later moved to Serang; others were trained at the Asahan school, the Cultuurschool at Soekaboemi, and a few at the secondary agricultural school at Buitenzorg and the native law school at Batavia.
Van Sluys: inspection and expansion
Governor Van Sluys, “not less than his predecessor convinced that for the people’s development popular education is a first requirement”, brought the institutions created under Swart to greater bloom. The inspection of popular education, until 1918 in the hands of the administration, was in that year brought under the inspection of the ordinary lower Indian education; the technical investigation he instituted led to the conference of January 1920 at Batavia, under the Director of Education, of chief officials of the department, advisers and inspectors with the Governor of Atjeh. His exertions had for result that after two years of administration (1920) the number of schools had increased by 28%, the number of pupils by almost 30%, and the number of girl pupils by more than 121%; in 1921 the total of native children receiving education stood at 25,000. Director N. van Zalinge observed in late 1922 that the government schools everywhere founded were well attended — giving reason to expect that whatever hatred of the Hollander still slumbered among the Atjehnese population would wholly have disappeared with a following generation.
See Also
Source
Vijftig jaren economische staatkunde in Atjeh, by Joh. Langhout (The Hague: N.V. Boekhandel v/h W. P. van Stockum & Zoon, 1923), pp. 91–92, 100–102, 118–119, 126.